Hero
by AikoNamika
Summary: Even heroes need someone to start them on the right path...and sometimes, those people need someone to give them a kickstart as well. Even if it's from their future self.


Title: Hero  
Author: Aiko Namika  
Fandom: Final Fantasy VII  
Characters: Crisis Core-ish Zack and Cloud, AC-ish Zack  
Disclaimer: I lay absolutely no claim to the characters and world contained herein.  
Warnings: Not much. Vague spoilers for the game(s) based on what I've filched off the Internet?  
Notes: A very belated birthday fic for icedarkelf! She gave me the prompt of "Zack and Cloud fluff," and I'm not all that sure it turned out all that fluffy, but the bunny bit and wouldn't let go.

--

"It's hard to believe that he's going to save the world some day, isn't it?"

Zack jerked around in surprise – surprise partially because of the words themselves, but also partially because someone had managed to sneak up on him, a SOLDIER First Class. Then that surprise turned to shock as he stared, not at an uber-sneaky ninja, or a mischievous SOLDIER who'd practiced his stealth to the ends of Gaia, or a Turk, but...himself. Sort of.

Violet eyes grinned into violet eyes, as the older version of Zack snickered companionably at his younger self's predicament.

"Sorry about that. Okay, no I'm not," he said, and Zack knew that he'd never have believed the "sorry" anyway, because he wouldn't be sorry if he'd been able to do something like that.

The other Zack was definitely older – not by too many years, he didn't think, but he looked as if he'd been pared to the bone, whipcord and muscle with nothing left for anything else. His hair had been chopped short, and there were a number of new scars adorning the skin that was left bare by his uniform. He looked like he'd been through hell and back, and considering that Zack could actually see the buildings on the other side of the practice area through him, it didn't look like he'd quite survived.

"Uh, what?" he finally managed, both at the presence of a ghost-version of himself, and at what said ghost-version had said initially.

"Cloud," the older man said, gesturing with his head toward the diligently-practicing recruit. The boy obviously hadn't noticed his mentor's situation, and continued through the sword drill with all of the steadfast determination that had caught Zack's eye in the first place. He wasn't naturally skilled, and the motions didn't come easily to his hand, but he practiced over and over, until he had each one down perfectly. "It's hard to believe that he's going to save the world some day, when you look at him like that."

"...wait, Cloud's going to save the world? From what?" He should probably be a lot more weirded out by that particular proclamation, but he couldn't quite find it in himself to pull those emotions up, because who could he believe if he couldn't believe himself? "And, for that matter, what about me? And Seph? Why aren't we going to be helping him, much less the rest of the ShinRa army?"

"Well, Seph won't be helping since Cloud'll be saving the world _from_ him, because he decided that going insane and slaughtering thousands, destroying the world with the most powerful destructive spell, and becoming a god sounded a _lot_ better than sitting through yet another budget meeting."

Cue another confused stare.

"Okay, it was partially because he was influenced/possessed by his space-alien-bitch of a genetic donor, but that's not all that important, because it's not like that's all that avoidable, sadly. And as for me...well, I died. As you can see." The older Zack seemed far more flippant than the younger Zack was about the whole "being dead" situation, not to mention the fact that Zack's best friend apparently was going to end up trying to be the downfall of the entire human race.

"So how is Cloud going to save the world?" he asked finally, instead of asking any of the other questions that were percolating on his tongue. "I mean, he's good, there's no doubting that, but even if he makes SOLDIER First Class, it's impossible to _really_ match up to Seph."

"Don't worry about it so much!" Older-Zack said, his grin suddenly turning satisfied, as if one of his plans had been pulled off perfectly. It made him seem younger, almost like the image that Zack saw in the mirror every morning, which was even weirder, actually.

"He's strong; stronger than you think, really, a _lot_ stronger, and a lot more skilled than he is now. He'll be able to handle Sephiroth, though...he isn't going to have an easy time of it." As they watched, the Cloud of the here-and-now stumbled suddenly at a particular move, and then shook his head fiercely and re-did the move again, and again, and again, until it flowed a lot more smoothly. It still wasn't perfect, but he wasn't practically tripping himself up.

"He's going to go through hell, worse than anything you can think of. War's bad enough, but this...it wasn't fun. At all. He's not just gonna bend, he's gonna _break_, and not just once. But that's the thing about him; he doesn't ever lose that stubbornness there," Older-Zack continued, pride gleaming in his eyes. "He just keeps on coming. I still don't have a clue where he got that stubbornness, but I'm damn glad he's got it."

Zack watched the recruit in front of them as he continued with the drills, the boy still so small and skinny, half a head shorter than anyone else in the program at the least, with an inferiority complex that already had him believing in his own lack of self-worth. He took his older self's words and tried to fit them around Cloud, tried to see him as what he'd be like after all of that, and...couldn't quite. It wasn't there yet; if something horrible happened to him now, he'd shatter, and the SOLDIER wasn't even sure if the blonde's stubbornness would be enough to pull him back together again.

"He's got the basics of what he'll need now. Or rather, he's getting them," the older man said solemnly, and Zack jerked his attention back to him. "That's where you come in; where I _came_ in, once. He needs help even now, because what good is a hero who can't even save himself, right?" His expression was...indescribably sad. "Give him that push, because he needs to know that he can do it. You know how important a good mentor is to anyone, let alone a hero."

Angeal, who had given him the Buster Sword that even now hung across his back.

"Otherwise, there will be nothing left to show that _anyone_ was ever alive. He has to be able to save the world to make sure we live on, right? He doesn't look like he can do, it, but he can."

Zack couldn't look away from his older self as the man faded away with the faintest shimmer of pyreflies taking to the air.

"Teach him about his pride and dreams, because there will come times when he'll have nothing else to hold on to but those."

There was nothing left now, except for a single white feather, lying innocuously on the ground.

The SOLDIER crouched down and picked it up, and knew that it would join the two other feathers in his collection; one black as darkest night, the other as pale as the snow. He tucked it securely away, and then looked out over toward where Cloud was standing, his stance still awkward as it had always been at that point in the drill, gangly body still trying to grow, attitude hesitant but determined.

"A hero, huh?"

Looked like he still needed some help to be a hero; and that was Zack's job.

"Strife, watch your footwork!"

-fin-


End file.
